


The Stars are Projectors

by HDea



Series: Ace in Hand [4]
Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: Birthday, Breaking and Entering, Cake, Friendship is Magic, Underage Drinking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-28
Updated: 2014-01-28
Packaged: 2018-01-10 08:18:42
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,893
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1157287
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HDea/pseuds/HDea
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“We are not trespassing!  Do you hear me?  Get back here, we’re going back to the dorms.” </p><p>He was not getting pulled into another one of Vanessa’s ill thought out schemes.  She was trouble.  Why did he think that she had anything sane planned this evening….?  </p><p>THE RUM.</p><p>“How DARE you!  I am going back to the dorms, with or without you.”</p><p>“Then you'll just have to hear me talk about how awesome the planetarium is later, huh?”</p><p>“Vanessa, get back here.” He charged forward to try and pull her back.</p><p>“Nyuuuuup!” She twisted her arms and he could hear the click of the lock open. “There it is. You coming with, birthday boy?”</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Stars are Projectors

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sherriaisling](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sherriaisling/gifts).



> Another flashback to Hermann and Vanessa growing up together. This is the universe associated with my main fic Ace in Hand. Basically, Vanessa is Luna's biological daughter that was put up for adoption in the US and then adopted back when she was 14. She now goes to private school with Hermann in London because Luna and Stacker are often moving around because of the military work they do. Hermann and Vanessa are 100% platonic best friends forever.
> 
> Sherriaisling suggested that Hermann and Vanessa would break into a planetarium and get drunk together and I agree that this should 100% happen, so it did. 
> 
> Title is taken from the Modest Mouse song of the same name.

June 10, 2005  
London, England

 

“WHARGHAAA! Urrrrrrgh, watch out for that spot.”

“Get up. What are you doing on the ground?”

“The ground came up and bit me, Hermann!” Vanessa tried to rock herself up onto her feet and just managed to fall again on top of her backpack. “Noooo! Control Z!!”

The rum that Vanessa had forced him to drink earlier made him miss her hand when he went to help her up and they struggled together to get her onto her feet.

“Why you so good at alcohol, Hurrah?”

“I’m German.” Vanessa had matched him, shot for shot, and was having a hard time staying on her feet, much less lead them to wherever it was that she insisted that they had to go that night. “Why are you so terrible at holding your alcohol?” 

“ ’Mmmm holdin’! YOU.” She missed touching his nose and instead poked his cheek. “Are bad at being drunk. Me? I’m the best at drunk. Varsity Drunk, right here. I’m going to Nationals, Herrablahalaaaaa.” She dissolved into giggles and had to lean against the nearest storefront.

“You’re not even trying anymore, are you?”

Vanessa just ignored his comment and darted ahead on wobbly legs, nearly falling over again as she turned sharply to go down an alley. “Almost there, probably!”

“Where is ‘here’?”

“Shh! Surprises!” She knelt down on the ground and started digging around in her backpack. When she finally found what she was looking for, she started giggling uncontrollably again.

“Vanessa, what are you doing?” The question was pointless as soon as he said it. She already had the picks in her hand and was attacking the lock on the door she was kneeling in front of.

“Shh! I almost got it.” Her whisper was loud and obnoxious and she was still unable to contain her laughter.

“We are not trespassing! Do you hear me? Get back here, we’re going back to the dorms.” 

He was not getting pulled into another one of Vanessa’s ill thought out schemes. She was trouble. Why did he think that she had anything sane planned this evening….? 

THE RUM.

“How DARE you! I am going back to the dorms, with or without you.”

“Then you'll just have to hear me talk about how awesome the planetarium is later, huh?”

“Vanessa, get back here.” He charged forward to try and pull her back.

“Nyuuuuup!” She twisted her arms and he could hear the click of the lock open. “There it is. You coming with, birthday boy?”

“No!” Hermann narrowed his eyes. “And my birthday was yesterday.”

She scrunched up her nose and rolled her head along with her eyes. “So what? That's not the point.”

“That is exactly the reason you said you were dragging me across London.”

“Oh yeah.” She puffed out her cheeks and looked everywhere but at him. “Welp, ladies first.” And she pushed the door open and walked in as though it was perfectly normal for her to be entering the London Planetarium via the back door at midnight.

Damn her! He really should leave her. Nothing good could come from this. They could get _arrested_.

Hermann cursed to himself before going through the door to chase after her. She hadn’t made it too far – she was once again on the ground and struggling to stand up.

“Where are you going?” He hissed at her. They were not going to get caught trespassing. Not if he had any say in this venture.

“Where the stars are, Heyday.”

“Shh! It's this way, you impossible woman.”

“That's the spirit!” She tried to slap his shoulder but missed and nearly fell over again.

“Shh!”

This was not the first time that Hermann had been to the London Planetarium, so he made short work of finding his way to the auditorium. Vanessa had to pick one more lock, but the whole adventure seemed far too easy. Why wasn’t there tighter security? The place was a national treasure!

Vanessa was not interested in any of his questions about the lack of security or his opinions on where they should be on a Friday night – namely anywhere but where they were currently. Instead she walked toward the center of the room.

“Oooh, what's that?” She pointed at the apparatus in the center of the room. The machinery was exactly the sort of thing that Vanessa liked and also the sort of thing that Hermann needed to make sure that she did not touch under any circumstances.

“The projector.” He tried to act nonchalant. That should work. Make it seem as uninteresting as possible.

“Whaaaat? Why do they need a projector?” She was circling the projector, keeping her hands to herself, but obviously interested. He couldn’t allow her to break the projector for the London Planetarium. If he had to murder her, he would stop her from damaging the projector.

“To show people the stars, Vanessa.” He darted in front of her and slowly pushed her back toward the first row of seats.

“Huh? Why don't they use telescopes?” She was trying to move around him, but NO.

“Because we are in London.”

That stopped her. She turned to him, hands on her hips, and glared. “So now the British are too good for telescopes?”

“The light pollution from the city makes it pointless to try to observe stars in the city. That is why we use the _projector_ to look at the stars.”

She physically deflated and looked between Hermann and the projector with wide eyes “What?! But- but- this is a planetarium!”

“That does not mean that there are telescopes.”

“But the Adler has telescopes!”

“What is an Adler?”

“THE PLANETARIUM! Urgh, this is the worst!”

“Shh! Would you be quiet?! Are you saying that we broke into the London Planetarium because you thought there would be telescopes?”

“Durr! Ugh, London is the worst. If we were in Chicago we could look at the stars.” She collapsed slowly onto the floor and hugged her backpack.

“Don't lie on the floor. Why are we here, Vanessa?

“Because you wanted to see the stars, but there aren't any stars in London.”

Hermann drank too much rum earlier. That was why he was in this situation, with the heels of his palms rubbing his eyes, trying to persuade his best friend to get off of the floor so that they did not get caught breaking and entering. Either that or he did not drink _enough_ rum earlier. After he gets them out of this mess, he is definitely going to drink the rest of the bottle in Vanessa’s backpack and forget that any of this ever happened.

“Sorry I messed up your birthday.” Vanessa was sitting up now with her backpack in her lap.

“My birthday was yesterday.” He snapped, and regretted his biting tone. Vanessa was infuriating, but she was trying to be thoughtful. He knew that, but they were _trespassing._. How was he supposed to feel?

Thankfully, she ignored his thoughtless comment. “I bought you a cake.”

“What?”

“But I think I smooshed it when I fell down.” She pulled out a small cardboard cake box from her backpack. Two of the corners were crushed, but it looked surprisingly intact considering the number of falls that Vanessa had made that night.

She was trying. For him. The least he could do was try for her.

“The projector, Vanessa.”

“Sorry. Supposed to be a telescope, but the British are stupid.”

There was no helping Vanessa. He was going to have to go figure out the controls for the projector on his own because she was plastered and talking to a cake box about how stupid the British were. 

He definitely had too much rum earlier. That had to be the reason why he was circling the room to find the controls to the projector. That was why he was trying to decipher the labels on the control panel that was installed in the podium at the far end of the theatre using only the light from the track lighting on the floor. It was definitely the rum that made it seem like a good idea to turn on the projector and display the summertime sky instead of erasing every trace that they were ever here and leaving.

He was never going to drink rum again.

“I am never drinking rum again.” He told Vanessa when he made it back to the spot on the floor that she was laying on.

“Okay. Do they make the projector for the ceiling or the ceiling for the projector?”

“I have no idea what you are talking about.” There was no way that he was going to lay on the floor when the seats were just a few steps away and they reclined to a laying position.

“Which came first? The projector or the ceiling?”

“Considering that it is unlikely that is the original projector, I would say the ceiling.”

Vanessa’s response was just an indifferent hum as she collapsed into the seat next to him and placed the cake box on his chest before leaning back to stare at the ceiling. “This fake sky almost looks like the real sky.”

“Why does the cake say ‘dinosaur’?”

“Huh?” Vanessa leaned up in her seat and looked at the open cake box in Hermann’s hands. Inside was a small chocolate cake with candy letters that spelled ‘DINOSAUR’ in capital letters that were smashed into an uneven line. “Oh yeah! I could only afford one set of candy letters and that's the longest word I know that doesn't have repeats.” The last three letters were pushed close together and he could imagine Vanessa panicking as she ran out of space on the cake to spell out the word.

“Why didn't you write Herman?” He picked up one of the plastic forks that were thrown into the box and took a bite of cake.

“Because Hermann has two n's, duh.” She picked up her own fork and scooped off the letter D.

“No, ‘Herman’. Spelled with one n.”

She rolled her eyes and crunched into the candy letter. “That's not your name.”

“It's close.”

“And _wrong_. Why would I spell your name wrong when I can spell dinosaur right?”

“…”

“…”

“You could have written ‘birthday’.”

“What?” She scrunched her nose and counted silently on her fingers. “Fuck. Okay, next year I’ll write birthday.”

“Or you could buy more letters.”

“That’s a terrible idea, Hummer.”

They spent the next couple hours with Hermann pointing out constellations and Vanessa asking absurd questions about the mythology while taking turns eating cake and drinking rum until they fell asleep in the reclining chairs.

It would have been perfect except they didn't manage to wake up and leave before security found them in the morning. 

There are few things as horrifying as waking up drunk in a strange place to the sound of your best friend unconvincingly trying to persuade a security guard that they had been locked into the planetarium the night before.

One of those things turns out to be the experience of being drunk and handcuffed to a chair while a very angry Stacker Pentecost individually questioned them as to why they were drunk and how they got into the planetarium and why he shouldn't just let the police take them to Scotland Yard.

Hermann was definitely never going to drink rum again.

**Author's Note:**

> Fact: I re-wrote huge sections of this because there isn't a planetarium in London with telescopes -- at least that is the impression Google put me under, so maybe not fact? Whatever.
> 
> Hermann's birthday landed on a Thursday in 2005, and I can't imagine that Vanessa could have talked Hermann into getting drunk and breaking curfew on a school night. Also, I imagine that Hermann is the sort of person that you don't realize how drunk they are until they are basically blackout drunk. He's probably actually as drunk as Vanessa is.
> 
> "Dinosaur" is not a nod to the future of Kaiju, but rather because when I was an asshole middle school kid, my friends and I would pry the keys off of the keyboards in computers class and rearrange them to spell out words to confuse people that couldn't type without looking at their hands. Dinosaur was the longest word we could think of at the time, so we always replaced QWERTY with it. I realized while I was writing this that Birthday has the same number of letters and there you have it.


End file.
